Sunday, May 20, 2012

SOME RVING THOUGHTS & TOO MANY GROCERIES FOR THE SADDLEBAGS

A LITTLE COLOR CREATIVITY IN GOOGLE’S PICASA 3.9:))

Ever buy too many groceries to fit in your saddle bags? Yep, did that one this morning. Spent a couple fine Sunday morning hours tooling around our quiet countryside on the bike. On the way back to Bayfield I stopped at a supermarket in Goderich for a few groceries. Forgot I had all my rain gear in one of the saddlebags so when I returned to the parking lot with a bag of apples, 2 quarts of Soy Milk, a bunch of bananas, two large containers of Cranberry Juice, two tubs of Blueberry Yogurt & 3 quarts of skim milk I had myself quite a job stuffing into ,& tying stuff onto, the Motorcycle. We all made it safely home albeit a few bruised bananas. And nuts, I didn’t think to take a few pics of my precarious load.

NORTHERN FLICKER

Had us one mighty hot & humid day going on so I cranked the A/C for the first time this year. That now makes it official…………I can comfortably beginning complaining about another hot summer season again. Yahouie Louie, let the griping begin:))

OUR IRIS FLOWERS ARE FINALLY OUT

In Saturday’s post, JUDY suggested, in a comment, that I had a contradiction of terms in a statement I made. My statement was, “"But, knowing ourselves as well as I do, I also know, that by now our minds would be once again evolving towards towards ‘something different. Not being a creature of ‘same old, same old’ it’s just the way I am & it’s just the way we are”:)) Judy’s question was: ‘Is that not a contradiction to buying a house in AZ? Just curious about how you think you'll feel after a few winter trips there.’

ANOTHER SPLASH DOWN FOR POPPA GOOSE…MOMMA GOOSE IS STILL ON THE NESTFirst, let me define the word, ‘evolve’: To develop or achieve gradually: evolve a style of one's own.DEER PARK LODGE…..WE SURE LOVE THE COLOR GREEN IN OUR NECK OF THE WOODS

I think what Judy is getting at is this….if we have been getting a little tired of traveling to the same old places, won’t we get tired of going to our Congress house winter after winter too?? Yes, the excitement & newness of a house in the southwest will wear off after awhile for sure, but there is a difference here. First, at this stage of our RV lifestyle, our intentions are not to just go to our Congress house & sit there for the winter. How boring would that be!! That eventually may happen but our traveling minds are just not there yet & we are still in basic traveling Snow Bird mode. Remember, this is an evolving process for us. I have used the term ‘home base’ to describe our place & for now & until things change we intend to use our Congress location as a base for future travels around the southwest. We hope to work away at the house for awhile, take a few weeks to travel off somewhere, a few more weeks or month at the house, some more time on the road, etc. I think that should make for a very interesting & adventurous winter for us between house & travels. It will be something different, & for me, that is the key:)) KELLY PICKED UP A FEW ITEMS AT A BAYFIELD YARD SALE TODAY….CAN YOU GUESS WHERE THEY ARE HEADED?? YEP, ARIZONA:))

If one thing is for sure, it is simply the fact that ‘nothing is for sure.’ If, in the future we tire completely of the Congress house & find out our home base plan is not turning out how we expected, we will simply stick the ‘For Sale’ sign back in the ground & move on to whatever & wherever our minds our heading next. I remember well about half a dozen years ago going round & round in circles trying to decide if we should sink some major money into an RV. What about going south for the winters? What about this, what about that, what if, what if?? Decisions were finally reached & we have been evolving ever since. Our Congress house is just another in a series of steps in the continuing process. I know where we were 5 years ago & I know where we are know. I do not have clue where we will be in 5 years from now but I do rest comfortably in the thought that it will probably not voluntarily be, ‘same old stuff, same old location’ day after day!! MOURNING DOVES

Ok, why Congress Arizona & not somewhere else? First, right off the top, let me tell you that we landed in Congress last March by accident & not by design. Had we not run into our little Saturday morning fiasco in Lake Havasu & re-routed ourselves a week later we probably never would have been in the Congress/Wickenburg area at all. It was just kind of a fluke. As mentioned in Saturday's post, Kelly always checks the Real Estate market in any area we travel to & sure enough, after a few days boondocked between Congress & Wickenburg a house of interest popped up. Already having decided we liked the area we decided to have a look & you know the rest of the story up till now. AZALEA FLOWER >>>

After checking my Atlas one day early on, I realized Congress was ideally situated just about right smack dab in the center of the whole southwest area we liked so much. New Mexico, Arizona, & California. Although north of Phoenix it was still in the warmer temperate desert climate for the winters. And yet just a 15 minute drive north of our house & up atop the Weaver Mountains plateau was a completely different landscape with a completely different climate. Wow, how great was that. We could be in the totally dry Sonoran desert with Saguaro cactus in our front yard & yet just a short 15 minutes later we could be in a mountainous Pine forest with possible snow on the ground. Reminded me so much of my 3 years living in British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley back in the early 70's.

<<< DEER PARK

RETIRED ROD, in his comment says, "Have you ever actually slept a night in the Congress House? I thought you were sleeping in the motorhome when you were there. So you can't sell it yet, until you spend a night in it"!! Now, there is a scary point. No, for the short duration we were at the house in March we stayed in our Motorhome, mainly because we had no beds in the house. But, here's the scary part. What if the house turns out to be haunted by the ghost of the old gold miner who originally built it. Yikes!! Our place is located on a two mile long dead end road. We are about half way. South end of Ghost Town Road starts in Congress & the north end stops at the rocky Congress Gold Mine. That Gold Mine was the driving force behind the old dusty town of Congress years ago & the feller who built our house, worked in that Gold Mine just a mile up the road. Guess we'll find out in the fall if anything goes 'creak' in the night. Say, I wonder if maybe he might have stashed a few bags of gold nuggets under the floor. And, just as soon as I can get myself back into 'reading mode' again I will certainly be reading up on all the old wild west history of the area. And, from what I understand, there is lots to read about. Maybe not the colorful cast of Tombstone characters or legendary historic names like Cochise & Geronimo, but I'm sure the area has had it's period of wild west desperados & nefarious characters. After all, it is the great American west:))

OUR BAYFIELD BACKYARD JUNGLE IS FILLING IN QUITE NICELYWe welcome PAT BROOKS aboard today as our first Blog Follower to break our list’s 500 mark. Nice to have you along Pat & congrats on getting through Google’s hoops & barrels to finally get yourself on board:))

GROANER’S GROANER:(( Howard County Police officers still write their reports by hand, and the data is entered later by a computer tech into their database. One theft report stated that a farmer had lost 2,025 pigs. Thinking that to be an error, the tech called the farmer directly. "Is it true Mr. (Smith) that you lost 2,025 pigs?" she asked. "Yeth." lisped the farmer. Being a Howard County girl herself, the tech entered: "Subject lost 2 sows and 25 pigs." --------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Tourists see the world, travelers experience it. - Home is where your pet is:)) - The only thing better than right now will someday be the memories of right now...AL. stargeezerguy@gmail.com

It isn't about the house ...It's about life...and life is about change..This is something we all come to at one point or another...Change can show up at any time...That is the only thing we can be sure of..."things will change" in our lives...go with the flow....

Love your thinking! Nothing is forever.....except for God's love! As John and I head out in September (we hope) we hope to follow your example of being open to any and all things possible. Thank you soooo much for your posts. They are so encouraging!

Be sure to keep me updated on that Congress history....... I think you have the right idea,,,,don't worry about the ghosts,,,,shoot they are everywhere...I just don't bother them and they don't bother me... I know some of them tho, when I see or hear one I know we have a nice visit....Good to hear about your uncle.....all my uncles are gone,,,,they are GHOST's now!!! Thats what I'm gona be someday,,,a ghost!! :-)

Great post and your plans sounds like a winner, Life itself is always evolving and if we don,t we stagnate.You are and do who you are and you have to be true to yourself. If you are comfortable with you, that is what counts!!

had to smile w/ your mention of 5 years down the road....reminds me of hr people that during an interview ask 'where do you see yourself 5 y ears from now' I always wanted to say, how in the H am I suppose to know...alive I hope." no one really knows what will happen over a 5 year span

AL'S CAMERA EQUIPMENT

A sometimes asked question readers have about my blog is what kind of a camera do I use. Well I have 8 of them and use them all. Five Nikon DSLR's, two quality Sony point and shoots plus one older Canon point and shoot.

'UPDATE':: July 2017 Thanks to a very generous blog reader I have been able to update my Nikon camera equipment and supplement my camera gear with a couple additional fine Sony cameras as well.I now have a 'donated' Nikon D7200 sporting my new Nikkor 18-300 3.5 zoom lens. Also have picked up a new Nikkor 1.8 primary 35mm lens. In addition I also now have a Sony RX100-3 camera as well as a Sony Exmore Cybershot. I have given my Canon Powershot point and shoot camera to a neighbor.

- In early 2017 I replaced my Nikon D-90 camera with a new D-3400 after the 'auto focus' feature on my aging D-90 quit working. The Nikon D-90 had been my work horse camera sporting a Nikkor 18-55mm 1:3.5-5.6 lens. I used this camera for most of my landscapes and I now have it set up for night photography where 'auto focus' is not necessary.

-My older faithful and favorite Nikon D-40 finally packed it in during the summer of 2015 and I replaced it with a new Nikon D-3100.

- Previous to my Nikon D-90, most of my photos were taken with my old faithful Nikon D-50 from 2006 to early 2011 whereupon the D-50 suffered a rather gruesome death when it fell off a table onto a cement porch in southeastern Arizona. The 70-300mm lens on the camera survived the fall but the D-50 did not. My Nikkor lenses are interchangable between the D-90 the D-3100 and the D-3400.